Can you see the resemblance?

(Thanks to possibly Australia's biggest Charlotte Bobcats fan for posting this)

World-famous rapper Snoop Dogg, renowned as a Los Angeles Lakers fan, has been performing in Australia this past week. Whilst welcoming in the New Year in Adelaide, at the Summadayze Festival (Rymill Park), he represented recently fallen Portland Trail Blazers star Brandon Roy. Roy recently announced his retirement from the sport due to debilitating knee injuries.

As you may have heard, Golden State Warriors guard, Monta "Moped" Ellis has been accused of sexual harassment by a former team employee. As the LA Times describes:

A former Golden State Warriors employee filed a sexual harassment lawsuit against star guard Monta Ellis on Wednesday, alleging Ellis sent her unwanted texts that included a photo of his genitals.

In her lawsuit, which also names the team, Erika Ross Smith alleges Ellis began sending her several dozen explicit messages, sometimes several times a day, starting in November 2010 while she worked for the team's community relations department.

The messages included lines such as, "I want to be with you," and "Hey Sexy," and periodically asked her what she was wearing or doing, according to the lawsuit.

Smith would often reply with "What do you want?" or "I am sleeping," the lawsuit claims.

"On a micro level, my client has endured unwanted harassment, has suffered and continues to suffer emotional distress and trauma," her attorney, Burt Boltuch, said at a news conference in his Oakland office. "On a macro level, this type of conduct, especially in the sports world, must stop. She was embarrassed. She was intimidated. She felt scared and helpless."

As always, when something controversial erupts in the NBA, the Taiwanese animators at Next Media Animation have an entertaining, animated, visual take on it:

These new additions to the New Orleans Hornets (arrivals as a result of the Chris Paul to the Los Angeles Clippers deal) sure do look happy to be putting on those teal jerseys, don't they?

From left to right: Al-Farouq Aminu, Eric Gordon, Chris Kaman

Basketball as art is something that we've shown a big appreciation for at A Stern Warning, through our bartsketball concept. So it will come as no surprise as a continuation of the concept, that this exhibition excites me.

The Art of Basketball exhibit, held recently in Miami helped raise money for inner-city kids, by selling basketball-related artwork, created on the hardwood used at the NBA All-Star Game. Chris Bosh and other Miami Heat players got involved. Some of the stuff is amazing, as you can see in the following video:

You can read more about Art of Basketball at their website. Unfortunately, not a lot of the art is available on that site, but I did find someone on flickr who had captured a bunch of photos:

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR. 

You can read more articles centred on the bartsketball concept here.

The NBA can't claim that this trade was better for the New Orleans Hornets than what they were likely to receive from the Los Angeles Lakers. After caving in to Comic Sans pressure from numerous NBA executives and owners, the league nixed a three-team deal that would have ultimately netted the Hornets forwards Lamar Odom and Luis Scola, guards Kevin Martin and Goran Dragic and a 2012 first-round pick from the Houston Rockets. 

Instead, the deal as currently constituted, will send Chris Kaman, Eric Gordon, Al-Faroqu Aminu and a Minnesota Timberwolves 2012 first rounder to the Hornets, in exchange for all-star point guard Chris Paul going to the Los Angeles Clippers.

The move, which is expected to go through uncontested (as many point out doesn't boost the much-maligned Lakers), will make the Clippers a very formiddable and entertaining team, with Paul feeding young star forward Blake Griffin and recently signed forward Caron Butler. This trio is not of the magnitude of the "Superfriends" in Miami (LeBron James, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade) on the face of things, but it certainly makes for some primetime TV battles, along with the New York Knicks conglomerate of Amar'e Stoudemire, Carmelo Anthony and newly acquired Olympian Tyson Chandler.

The Lakers, long the superpower in LA, are in a vulnerable position with the ageing of Kobe Bryant, the shipping of Lamar Odom to Dallas and the uncertainty of whether they can acquire Superman Dwight Howard.

Either way, the Clippers fans are laughing.

It really does seem like Shaquille O'Neal is mellowing and reducing the ego a bit with age. Or is he just playing the diplomat in talking platitudes about Kobe Bryant because he is in Los Angeles promoting his book?

This is a book that I look forward to leafing through. I'm sure that the Big Aristotle has more than a few interesting stories to share.

So, news has come that the NBA lockout is over. I suppose we're duty-bound to be jumping around the room in glee and excitement?

Should I be apologising that I'm not?

The fact is, as I mentioned here, the lockout was yet another impetus to lead me to question if basketball should play such an overriding presence in my life. The conclusion was: there are a stack of other things which we all could be spending our time on, rather than obsessing over a bunch of sports stars and their labour disputes.

Please don't take this as a dark, cynical, woe-is-me attitude. It's not. I still love the game. I just don't enjoy some of the aspects that surround the game.

Hey, I still enjoy many of those aspects that surround the game too. Things like this are cool to hear. I'm just taking this moment to dedicate more of my time to other things and to not be too one-dimensional.

Will it be great to have the NBA back on our screens? Definitely. Am I over-joyed, skipping down the street that this season is back? Not really. Can we even call it a season?

Being a shortened season, much like the last post-lockout season we witnessed, it will have a great big asterisk next to it in the record books.

I guess it will feel a bit more like an entree to the 2012/13 season, when things turn entirely back to normal... and then we wait for six years time when both parties have the right to dissolve the existing Collective Bargaining Agreement once again. Will lessons be learnt from this year's experience, or will we see another lockout?

The Next Media Animation guys in Taiwan have once again taken a light-hearted look at the lockout resolution, with one of their animated videos. Some of the likenesses are pretty horific, but some are spot on. Either way, it's a fun look at things.

Editor's Note:Rachel Weerasooriya is an Australian basketball fan with some serious opinions on the game, both in Australia's NBL and on the current situation afflicting the NBA. Here she voices her opinions on the NBA labour struggle which has gridlocked the game that is loved by so many.

Put your hand up if the Mavs vs Heat game on June 12 was the last time you thought you’d watch an NBA game for a while? It almost seems like a distant memory now. The ups and downs of the lockout have been well covered, however some of the reasons behind it (due to the media ban in discussing said topics) aren’t all that obvious to the naked eye.

The overwhelming majority of fans on the NBA Facebook page and those commenting on media articles and the like, tend to centre around comments such as these:

“It’s just millionaires vs billionaires. The owners are greedy.”
“I’m boycotting the NBA when it comes back. Greedy players.”

It turns out that in June in particular, when the NBAPA and NBA started discussing topics (that would be later covered in much more significant detail) there were already a few massive red flags that would likely result in a lockout. Some knew that the last Finals game would be the last for a little while, and that the following season would either be shortened as a result, or not go ahead at all. The truth, as always, requires a lot more digging and cross-referencing than what is seen on the surface. It’s funny just how many subjects fall into that category, so allow me to drop some facts on your head. They tend to come in handy when engaging in a healthy debate.

One of the topics the players and owners have not been in agreement on is the BRI. Well, what is it? A shortened form of a guy called Brian? Not quite.

The BRI (Basketball Related Income) is essentially a split between the owners and players of who takes home how much revenue in the form of ticket sales, parking, broadcast rights, concessions, etc. The current split is 57- 43% in favour of the players. Yes, you heard that right. More on that later.